The global green bond market hit a new all-time quarterly high during the second quarter of this year, as issuers brought $66.6bn to market, according to the latest update from Moody's.
The influential credit ratings giant said global green bond issuance was now on track to surpass $200bn by the year's end, setting a new record for the market in the process.
Issuance grew 47 per cent to $117bn during the first six months of 2019 compared to the same period last year, Moody's latest quarterly green bonds market report found, with corporates providing the strongest contribution during the second quarter with over 40 per cent of the total.
At $14.9bn, non-financial corporate issuance accounted for 22 per cent of total volumes during the most recent quarter, while the $13.6bn of financial corporate issuance accounted for 20 per cent, it said. Meanwhile, sovereign bonds accounted for 17.9 per cent, and government-backed entities 16.5 per cent.
On a regional basis, European issuers lead the way with a 54 per cent share of the global green bonds market in the second quarter, aided by the Dutch government's huge $6.7bn sovereign bond earlier this year. The Asia-Pacific region achieved a 23.8 per cent market share, followed by North America on 13.1 per cent and Latin America at 3.9 per cent.
Moody's said the European Commission's recently-published sustainable finance taxonomy plans, including a new Green Bond Standard, should further support green bond market growth.
"The EU Green Bond Standard, which incorporates the sustainable finance taxonomy, would represent an important step forward in standardising and harmonising the green bond market in the EU, and could potentially also help support the global market's further growth and maturation," it said.
Meanwhile, beyond the green bonds market, Moody's said social and sustainability bond issuance was also continuing to grow rapidly, achieving combined issuance of $16.7bn in the second quarter and setting a new record for these categories.
The findings are based on data from the Climate Bonds Initiative, although Moody's uses its own separate assessment methodology.
In June, the Climate Bonds Initiative said it believed global issuance could reach as high as $1tr in the early 2020s, after the market surpassed $100bn within the first half of the year - a first for the nascent market.
The latest market findings came as US non-profit community development institution The Low Income Investment Fund announced a $100m Sustainability Bond Issuance as part of an inaugural public debt offering which it said was ten times oversubscribed.
And elsewhere, QIC Global Real Estate yesterday announced a AUD$300m green bond for capital expenditure linked with its asset development and sustainability objectives, in what it claimed was a world first for the global retail property sector.
The Australian real estate investor said it expected the capital investment to lead to a minimum 35 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions intensity in three of the assets within its QIC Shopping Centre Fund portfolio.
